Chapter 6
Jaylin dragged himself out of bed when his alarm went off, glaring when he saw the fresh, dark purple bruises on his wrists and on his neck. He was once again grateful it was winter and that he had the excuse for long sleeves and high collars.
He wasn’t sure what he’d do once the weather got nice again.
Just thinking about three or four more months with Brent had bile rising in his throat, and he shoved those thoughts away. He had to take things day by day. Had to just keep putting one foot in front of the other. That was how he’d always survived.
He grabbed his backpack and a granola bar for the road, then headed out to the library. It was even colder today, and Brent’s coat was practically useless, so Jaylin was glad that he had opted to layer heavily. He was looking forward to getting his warm coat back from Hiro.
Even if he wasn't looking forward to seeing Hiro, exactly.
It wasn’t that he didn’t want to see Hiro again, because he did.
He owed the man a lot, and aside from Jaylin wanting to apologize again, he…
liked Hiro. It wasn’t just that Hiro was nice to him, it was the way he was nice.
How he continually thought of Jaylin’s preferences when treating Jaylin to food, or how bright his smile got whenever Jaylin went along with Hiro’s slightly quirky sense of humor.
It was the way he asked questions about Jaylin that made it seem like Hiro was genuinely interested, like Jaylin was a person worth his interest. Jaylin just liked… he liked spending time with him.
But Jaylin had also been a supreme mess yesterday. He wasn’t sure he wanted to face Hiro down. The man must be thinking the worst of Jaylin’s poor behavior.
Aditi provided a welcome distraction. She was already there when Jaylin showed up, even though he was definitely on time this week, and she was vibrating with some kind of energy.
Jaylin asked if everything was okay, and got a deluge of resources for dyslexic-friendly learning.
“This too,” Aditi said twenty minutes into the onslaught, while Jaylin blearily tried to keep up. She held up what looked like a large phone.
“What is it?” Jaylin asked, tentatively taking it.
“It’s a note-taker,” Aditi said brightly.
“Deepak invented it. There’s a little stylus that pops out the side–see?
And you write down your notes like you would write on paper, and it detects your handwriting to convert it into a dyslexic-friendly font.
It also integrates with an online database that tracks common misspellings and letter flipping and has machine learning capability so it can auto correct typos as it learns your handwriting.
It also can run all your notes through a text-to-speech function, which lets it recite everything out loud. ”
Jaylin stared down at the little rectangle. “So you just… you just have to write the notes down once?”
“Yeah! And then it’ll organize it all for you.
It takes dictation too, so you can just speak to it and it’ll take the notes for you, and it responds to vocal commands and will search or cross-reference if you ask it to, so it’s easier to find the information.
And it can wirelessly connect to printers.
Deepak finds it way more intuitive than trying to use a keyboard.
But I guess that depends on how you take notes and stuff. ”
“Wow.” Jaylin didn't have to pretend to be impressed. “That’s really amazing.”
“Right? I’m mad I didn’t come up with it myself.”
Jaylin tried to smile, since he knew Aditi meant well. “Thanks for showing me,” he said, and offered it back.
Aditi frowned at him, holding up her hands. “Uh, no? That’s for you.”
Jaylin blanched. “What? I can’t take this.”
“Yeah you can,” Aditi said matter-of-factly. “My brother literally invented it. I can give ‘em to anyone I want.”
“But…” Jaylin couldn't even imagine how much this thing had to cost.
Aditi stuck out her lip. “Do you know how badly Deepak wants to meet you? Hiro raved all about how smart you are, and Hiro doesn’t impress easily. Deepak’s dying to shove tech into your hands and make all your teachers suck it.”
“I–” Jaylin didn't have a response to that. Hiro had told other people that he thought Jaylin was smart? “Thank you?”
Aditi grinned at him. “You’re welcome!” She rubbed her hands together. “You can practice using it while we work on your statistics homework.”
Between Jaylin’s text-to-speech reader and Aditi’s note-taking present, the math was a breeze.
Jaylin didn't have to struggle through trying to read the word problems, because the text-to-speech gadget scanned them and then said them out loud for him.
Instead of having to squint and sweat to try to write down his work, he just said the steps out loud to the note-taker thing, and the formulas appeared on the screen.
“I could do this stuff with my eyes shut,” Jaylin said astonished, as the last problem set finished writing itself out from his dictation and Aditi gave him a thumbs up for a correct answer.
“I know,” Aditi huffed. “That’s the whole point.”
Jaylin couldn't help but beam as he looked down at his work, and Hiro’s words suddenly came back to him.
“If you didn’t have to memorize your textbooks, what else do you think you could do with your mind?”
Jaylin… kind of wanted to find out.
***
“I’m sorry for yesterday,” was the first thing Jaylin blurted out when he dropped into the chair across from Hiro at the cafe’s little table.
“Jaylin!” Hiro smiled at him, but it looked more brittle than his smiles usually did. “Hey there.”
“Hi,” Jaylin stumbled to say. “Sorry.”
“There’s nothing to be sorry about,” Hiro said quickly. “But did you walk here? It’s freezing out! And you didn’t…”
Jaylin realized, belatedly, that Hiro was holding up his coat like an offering. Jaylin stood to take it, cheeks hot.
“It’s okay,” he said, hanging his warm coat off the back of his chair for something to do. “It’s not too far. And I walk fast.” Though now that he was inside, after the cold outside and all the moving, he was overheating with all his layers. “Don’t worry about me.”
Hiro opened his mouth, then closed it again. He cleared his throat. “Why don’t I go order? Here–” he held up his phone. “I took a picture of the menu. I could read it out loud for you and you could tell me what you want. If you want?”
“Oh, I…” Jaylin darted a look at him. “Really?”
“Yeah, of course.” Of course. “I do it for Deepak all the time.”
“Oh, okay.” That made sense. And if Hiro was used to it, there was no harm in Jaylin taking the offer. “Then… sure, yeah. That’d be really, um, helpful.”
“Sure thing,” Hiro said warmly, and started to read. He was good at reading out loud. His voice was smooth and easy to listen to, and he didn't pause in weird places.
Jaylin listened as he de-layered, pulling off his hat and gloves and stuffing them in the pockets of Brent’s coat.
Then he unzipped said coat and draped it over the coat already on the back of his chair.
The caramel mocha sounded really good, so he went with that one.
At Hiro’s prodding, he also admitted that he wouldn’t say no to a slice of the lemon loaf. Hiro gave him a salute and set off.
Jaylin watched him go, wondering what he had done to deserve someone like Hiro giving him the time of day like this. Multiple times, even.
He didn’t get less uncomfortably warm as the minutes passed. The area Hiro had picked was right near a vent, which would normally be great, except that Jaylin was wearing a million layers.
He unzipped his hoodie, and eventually just took it off, then unbuttoned the flannel he was wearing over his T-shirt to get some air circulation.
That helped a lot, but by the time Hiro returned with a tray, Jaylin had also rolled up the sleeves of his flannel and was seriously considering taking it off and just looking like an idiot in a T-shirt, in the face of ten degree weather.
Hiro blinked at the pile of clothing now draped over the back of Jaylin’s chair, setting the tray down on the table. “I see you’re a pro at layering,” was all he said, as he slid over the plate of lemon loaf and a mug.
“Gotta be, in this weather,” Jaylin said, reaching to take the mug. He had finally removed enough that he wasn't too hot anymore, and the sip of caramel-coffee-mocha was delicious. He sighed into it, closing his eyes to enjoy. “Thank you.”
“Yeah,” Hiro said, sounding kind of odd. “Of course.”
Jaylin opened his eyes, about to ask if everything was okay, if Hiro’s order had maybe got messed up… and realized that Hiro was staring at his wrists.
His bruised wrists. That Jaylin had just exposed like an absolute idiot.
He took a shallow breath. He couldn't do anything about it now. Trying to hide them would just call more attention to the fact that he had fingerprints pressed into his skin, and—it wasn't anything, not really. Jaylin didn’t exactly want Brent to mark him up, but Jaylin was the one who had agreed to the relationship and Jaylin was the one taking Brent’s money.
If getting bruised up once in a while was part of the gig, that was fine.
It was fine.
“I, um, I appreciate you giving me back my coat,” Jaylin said, feebly trying to get Hiro’s attention onto something else. “I mean, like you said, I’m a pro at layering, but, you know. Having a nice coat helps.”
Hiro nodded. He looked like he was thinking something through. “Is your gray one not as nice?”
“It’s just not as warm,” Jaylin said. Admitted.
“It was a present though, so I-I feel bad if I don’t wear it.
” More like Brent’s remarks were always extra cutting whenever Jaylin didn’t wear his gift.
Jaylin hated the way Brent’s expression would go cold and cruel, how he’d say things like, “Do you even deserve the nice things I give you, if you don’t want to use them? ”
But it amounted to the same thing.
Hiro was quiet for a moment. Then he asked, “Is the person who gave you the gray coat the same guy who doesn’t like your brown one?”
Jaylin felt himself seize up before he remembered that it was okay, it was okay, it was just a question. It didn't matter. Hiro didn't know anything. He didn't know about Brent, or that Jaylin was doing what he was doing just to get through school.
Even if he did find out and never wanted to even look at Jaylin again, that would be—that would be fine.
Hiro had already done so much to help, and he certainly didn’t owe Jaylin his time or attention.
If Jaylin lost Hiro’s respect because of what Jaylin was doing to make things better for himself, that was just how life went.
It wouldn’t be a big deal.
“He just…” Jaylin curled his fingers around the sides of his mug, shifting in his seat. He was okay at lying to get by, but he didn't want to lie to Hiro. Hiro had only been good to him so far. Jaylin owed him more than dishonesty. “He just thinks the brown one isn’t as nice.”
“But it keeps you warmer,” Hiro said, looking… sad. It wasn’t a question.
Jaylin shrugged and took another sip of his drink.
The silence that fell was awkward. Jaylin struggled to come up with something to do or say to lift the mood, but his mind had blanked out, unable to stop the anxiety from rising up.
If Hiro found out about Brent, Jaylin didn’t just stand to lose Hiro’s respect.
Hiro could easily ruin Jaylin’s career before it even happened, if he talked about the sex work to other people.
Word like that would spread like wildfire in professional circles.
And that was if Brent himself didn’t try to drag Jaylin through the dirt.
Jaylin didn’t think that Hiro was the type of man to air someone else’s dirty laundry, but Jaylin didn’t really know him. What was a couple of meetings and a morning spent looking up disability services? Jaylin didn’t mean anything to Hiro, not really.
“I, uh…” Hiro leaned down to pick a little reusable tote up off the floor, setting it on the table. “I actually… I brought you something.”
It was an odd non-sequitur, and surprising on top of that. “You did?” Jaylin asked, staring at the tote. “What–uh—why?”
Instead of answering, Hiro pushed the tote forward, into Jaylin’s hands. Their fingers didn’t brush.
Uncertain, Jaylin reached into the tote and pulled out a scarf. It was light brown, with stripes of black and gray and little slivers of red running through it, with fringe on the ends. It looked thick and warm and soft.
His breath caught as he glanced up at Hiro.
“I noticed you didn’t have a scarf,” Hiro said. “And I just thought… you know. It might be nice to have an extra something to help keep you warm.”
“Oh,” Jaylin said, not even having to feign his surprise and pleasure.
It was such an incredibly thoughtful gift.
Hiro had noticed Jaylin didn’t have a scarf and had gotten him one.
“Um, wow, I… thank you.” He ran his fingers along the fringe.
It was indeed incredibly soft. “But Hiro, you… you didn’t have to…
” Hiro barely knew him. Why was he giving Jaylin anything at all, much less something so nice?
“I know,” Hiro said, lifting one shoulder. “But I wanted to.”
“Oh,” Jaylin said again. “But…why? You’ve already done so much for me.”
“Sometimes it’s nice to do things for other people just because,” Hiro said gently. “I thought you might like a scarf. I was hoping it might help keep you warm. That’s all.”
Jaylin studied him, trying to figure out if there was a motive.
Hiro’s kindness was still a foreign unknown, but he never made Jaylin feel stupid or unworthy because he had trouble with letters and numbers.
He asked Jaylin silly questions about food or class and seemed to do so for the sole purpose of finding out more about Jaylin’s likes and interests.
He invited Jaylin out and always ended with my treat, never expecting anything of Jaylin in return except perhaps some of his time.
He hadn’t tried to touch Jaylin even once.
Jaylin looked back down at the scarf in his hands and swallowed. There were something like butterflies in his belly. “It’s really nice, Hiro. Thank you. Really.”
Hiro smiled at him. “Wear it in good health, okay? And hey, it uh… it matches both of your coats. So you could wear it with whichever one you wanted.”
Jaylin would, he thought, curling his fingers into the soft scarf. He absolutely would, and screw Brent if he wanted to make a fuss.